I'm sorry, I love some baby boomers individually, but as a baby buster, the first generation with more education than their parents and a smaller paycheck, I want them (and the 'family values' that they didn't have back when they had families) to DIAF.

bigdavediode:StoneColdAtheist: bigdavediode: Look, you can't insult everybody who despises the baby boomer/worst generation, you'll be long dead first. There's just too much antipathy towards that generation, and for good reason.

Thank you for proving my point. Now, please reread your post carefully, then look up the definition of "irony".

Ah, I see -- you feel that the antipathy towards the baby boomers is just sour grapes and insults.

Sorry, but it's not. Would you like me to Google an editorial or two to explain why? Here, I'll just pick the first one I find about the "worst generation:"

"If they were animals, they'd be a plague of locusts, devouring everything in their path and leaving but a wasteland. If they were plants, they'd be kudzu, choking off ever other living thing with their sheer mass. If they were artists, they'd be abstract expressionists, interested only in the emotions of that moment -- not in the lasting result of the creative process. If they were a baseball club, they'd be the Florida Marlins: prefab prima donnas who bought their way to prominence, then disbanded -- a temporary association but not a team.

"Of course, it is as unfair to demonize an entire generation as it is to characterize an entire gender or race or religion. And I don't literally mean that everyone born between 1946 and 1964 is a selfish pig. But generations can have a unique character that defines them, especially if they are the elites of a generation -- those lucky few who are blessed with the money or brains or looks or skills or education that typifies an era. Whether is was Fitzgerald and Hemingway defining the Lost Generation of World War I and the Roaring Twenties, or JFK and the other heroes of the World War II generation, or the high-tech whiz kids of the post-Boomer generation, certain archetypes define certain times.

"You know who you are. If you grew your hair and burned your draft card on campus during the Sixties; if you toked, screwed, and boogied your way through the Seventies; if you voted for Reagan and believed "Greed is good" in the Eighties; and if you're trying to make up for it now by nesting as you cluck about the collapse of "family values," you're it. If not, even if demographers call you a Boomer, you probably hate our generation's elite as much as I do.

Penman:bigdavediode: "You know who you are. If you grew your hair and burned your draft card on campus during the Sixties; if you toked, screwed, and boogied your way through the Seventies; if you voted for Reagan and believed "Greed is good" in the Eighties; and if you're trying to make up for it now by nesting as you cluck about the collapse of "family values," you're it. If not, even if demographers call you a Boomer, you probably hate our generation's elite as much as I do.

So it's OK now to blame certain cultures/groups for the ills of society? I thought liberals were against that sort of thing.

I have no idea what "the liberals" are against. I do know that Republicans use labels to avoid thinking.

Well it is generalizing, of course. And there is a lot of anger in other generations towards baby boomers. But having said that, it's really just an accurate recollection of the historical failure of the worst generation. Take that editorial that I just posted - it goes on to say:

"Let's start with the Sixties, the Boomers' dilettante ball. While a few courageous people like John Lewis and the Freedom Riders risked their lives -- and others like Andrew Goodman, James Chaney, and Michael Schwerner gave theirs -- the civil-rights movement was led by pre-Boomers like Martin Luther King Jr. (who would be 71 if he were alive today) and continued without strong support from the Boomers on college campuses.

"Still, I must say this: If you were one of those young people who did risk their lives to fight racism in the Sixties, who put their bodies on the line to register voters, who marched and sang and taught and preached against segregation, you stand as the best refutation of my anti-Boomer tirade. In that one moment of conscience and courage, you did more with your life than I've done in all the moments of mine. In a generation of selfish pigs, you were saints.

"But the reality is that most campuses did not become hotbeds of unrest until the Boomers' precious butts were at risk as the Vietnam War escalated.

So let's have a little count here -- of the baby boomers posting, how many of you marched for civil rights, fought racism, registered voters BEFORE the Vietnam war put your butts on the line? And how many of you refused to embrace the "greed is good" mantra just two decades later?

low_dazzle:this country will look radically different in 10-20 years when they all die off.

can't wait

Dream on, loser boy. You're using life expectancy at birth. By the time you reach 65, your chances of hitting 90 or 100 are improved. There's a good chance the last of the Baby Boomers will be IMMORTAL.

But hey, we're a caretaker generation, so we'll look after you and your great-great-great grandchildren. You will never lack for cool cartoons from the 1960s and great B&W movies.

StoneColdAtheist:No, I think that people who paint with broad strokes should not get all butt-hurt when that same tactic is used against them. And in your case, I can see the butt-hurt from clear over here.

Alright. If it makes you feel better to think that people are just throwing sour grapes your way rather than pointing out painful historical facts about the baby boomers, have at it.

bigdavediode:riverwalk barfly: wow. how does that anger and generalizing taste?

Well it is generalizing, of course. And there is a lot of anger in other generations towards baby boomers. But having said that, it's really just an accurate recollection of the historical failure of the worst generation. Take that editorial that I just posted - it goes on to say:

"Let's start with the Sixties, the Boomers' dilettante ball. While a few courageous people like John Lewis and the Freedom Riders risked their lives -- and others like Andrew Goodman, James Chaney, and Michael Schwerner gave theirs -- the civil-rights movement was led by pre-Boomers like Martin Luther King Jr. (who would be 71 if he were alive today) and continued without strong support from the Boomers on college campuses.

"Still, I must say this: If you were one of those young people who did risk their lives to fight racism in the Sixties, who put their bodies on the line to register voters, who marched and sang and taught and preached against segregation, you stand as the best refutation of my anti-Boomer tirade. In that one moment of conscience and courage, you did more with your life than I've done in all the moments of mine. In a generation of selfish pigs, you were saints.

"But the reality is that most campuses did not become hotbeds of unrest until the Boomers' precious butts were at risk as the Vietnam War escalated.

bigdavediode:riverwalk barfly: wow. how does that anger and generalizing taste?

Well it is generalizing, of course. And there is a lot of anger in other generations towards baby boomers. But having said that, it's really just an accurate recollection of the historical failure of the worst generation. Take that editorial that I just posted - it goes on to say:

"Let's start with the Sixties, the Boomers' dilettante ball. While a few courageous people like John Lewis and the Freedom Riders risked their lives -- and others like Andrew Goodman, James Chaney, and Michael Schwerner gave theirs -- the civil-rights movement was led by pre-Boomers like Martin Luther King Jr. (who would be 71 if he were alive today) and continued without strong support from the Boomers on college campuses.

not being snarky. I'm a baby boomer by two days. I really don't get the anger at Baby boomers. My mother worked her ass off and saved for retirementI I'm not sure that she is even collecting her "earned" social security yet.

/work hard//play hard

"Still, I must say this: If you were one of those young people who did risk their lives to fight racism in the Sixties, who put their bodies on the line to register voters, who marched and sang and taught and preached against segregation, you stand as the best refutation of my anti-Boomer tirade. In that one moment of conscience and courage, you did more with your life than I've done in all the moments of mine. In a generation of selfish pigs, you were saints.

"But the reality is that most campuses did not become hotbeds of unrest until the Boomers' precious butts were at risk as the Vietnam War escalated.

not being snarky. I'm a baby boomer by two days. I really don't get the anger at Baby boomers. My mother worked her ass off and saved for retirementI I'm not sure that she is even collecting her "earned" social security yet.

riverwalk barfly:not being snarky. I'm a baby boomer by two days. I really don't get the anger at Baby boomers. My mother worked her ass off and saved for retirementI I'm not sure that she is even collecting her "earned" social security yet.

If you weren't a teen or in your early twenties during the 60's, chances are you're not in the same baby-boomer culture as most baby boomers. Some run the baby-boom right through 1964, which is rather excessive given that it's a baby boom from WWII.

Canadian males born in 1891 had a mean survival of 49 years. They had a median survival of 62 years (half of them lived to 1953). Any Canadian male who made it to age 49, however, would be likely to live past age 49. In other words, if you were age 49 in the year 1940, there was a chance you would have qualified for the old age pension in 1956.

This explains why there were old people alive when the life expectancy at birth was half of what it is today. One, a lot of people life beyond their life expectancy at birth, and two, medical science and economic growth have kept adding to the life expectancies at ages other than birth for the last couple of centuries more or less, barring wars, famines, pestilences, etc.

First site I grabbed data from: http://www.enotes.com/public-health-encyclopedia/life-expectancy-life-​tables

This is the New York Times. "It's a big F@5king deal!" as Joe Biden would say. Maybe it's grandfathered?

It didn't ask me to log in for some reason or other. Perhaps because I am in Canada, have a regestration, and haven't viewed a lot of NYT pages today or in the last couple of weeks. The Financial Times allows ten free views a month, I know. The NYT may be more or less generous.

But if it asks me to pay for high quality editorial and journalistic flap-doodle, screw it!

There's lots of other fish in the sea. Well, not really. But there were when I was a child. When I was a child, the oceans were teaming with fish and whales and birds. Now they're teaming with cheap plastic and Chinese super-freighters loaded ten or twelve high with container boxes full of more cheap plastic.

Fortunately, it isn't worth a Chinese Yuan to ship the containers back, so Americans will always have a box to sleep in. A very spacious and sturdy box, much better than a cardboard refrigerator box. Why ride the rails like a 1930s hobo when the boxes can come to you!

Pick:Why all the hate for Baby Boomers? Why do all these Gen Xers and Yers think they are hot shait?

Yeah, I'm one of the them.

They sound just like their parents did at that age. It's so cute. It's a shame they have to grow up.

If you're not a major success by age 16-35, the previous generations blocking your path are a good excuse. I define major success as able to afford the lifestyle you expect because after years of hard work, debt and doing without out, your parents and grandparents could afford to provide it for you.

My parents are always tut-tutting about young people nowadays who expect it all from the word go: houses, cars, appliances, big money, power, influence. Those things my 1930s-born elders had to work hard for and got partly because the economy went into a very long growth spurt and partly because they made their money the old fashioned way.

It was their high taxes that paid for the schools for the Baby Boomers, the old folks homes for their parents, and the college educations and marriages and stuff for their children and their children's children.

And yet all the little whingers are at the "Age of Ingratitude" now and have no respect for them or all the additional goodies that the Baby Boomers fought for and won.

The last time there was a Baby Boom Whine thread, I pointed out that the fool journalist did not do much research: most of the examples of Evil Baby Boomers he selected were born well before 1946 and even in the 1920s in one or two cases.

Some of them were old enough to fight in WWII and were thus members of the GREATEST GENERATION(TM by Dan Rather).

If the author of the present article graduated in 1980, he must have been a late Boomer at least, and probably a mainstream pre-crash Boomer.

By the way, if you think it's no fun being in the shadow of the Boomers, try to imagine being born right behind the peak--no matter what party you try to crash, it peaked several years before you showed up and everybody has moved on to the next party, leaving nothing but bottles full of cigarettes and trashed rooms.

Pick:Why all the hate for Baby Boomers? Why do all these Gen Xers and Yers think they are hot shait?

Yeah, I'm one of the them.

1: People hate old people, why?

A: Old people usually suck due to being bitter since they're about to die.

B: If they didn't leave the country in such a great state during their run, well obviously they're going to get the blame. Thanks boomers, why yes I would like to keep paying for social security even though I'll never see a cent of that back.

C: We Xers and Yers will certainly get our chance to fark things up, but meanwhile we have every right to blame boomers. If we're the way we are, its because you folks haven't exactly given us a rosy future to look forward to. Granted, its a viscous cycle in which one generation farks over the other over time. Still, boomers have been at the front of things and so most obviously people are going to hate on them.

bigdavediode:Penman: bigdavediode: become insane social conservatives because now "they knew better."

"If you're not a liberal at 20, you have no heart. If you're not a conservative at 40, you have no brain."

"If you spout mindless cliches, then you're a Republican."

""As people do better, they start voting like Republicans - unless they have too much education and vote Democratic, which proves there can be too much of a good thing."--Karl Rove on the difference between the Faith-based and the Fact-based communities

bigdavediode:brantgoose: You will never lack for cool cartoons from the 1960s and great B&W movies.

I'm pretty sure the best cartoons were from the 40's and 50's (Bugs Bunny, as an example.) The baby boomers gave us the three-frames-per-second "Rocket Robin Hood."

Hey, I had to stick the 1960s in there somewhere. It's true the WB cartoons are great but there were some wonderful cartoons from the low animation era. I love Rocky & Bullwinkle, which ran from the late 50s into the 60s; Mr. Magoo (pre-McBarker); The Flintstones has its great moments, and there's stuff like George of the Jungle which runs on into the 1970s.

God, I hate Rocket Robin Hood though. Have you seen Crusader Rabbit, the first made-for-TV crap? You have to be really picky digging through TV cartoons, but some of them have enormous camp value or period charm.

And so I'll see your Rocket Robin Hood and raise you The Grinch Who Stole Christmas and the 1960s Charlie Brown holiday specials, before they ran out of good holidays and had to do Charlie Brown and the True Meaning of Arbor Day.

You can't win against us Boomers. We can BS with the best generations in history. Our patron saint is Mel Blanc. Or Mel Brooks. I forget which.

bigdavediode:If you weren't a teen or in your early twenties during the 60's, chances are you're not in the same baby-boomer culture as most baby boomers. Some run the baby-boom right through 1964, which is rather excessive given that it's a baby boom from WWII.

This part I actually agree with. Boomers born in the first decade of our generation are the direct progeny of WW2 veterans, and are imprinted with their hopes, dreams and fears (lots of those!). In contrast, those born in the later '50s and up to '64, generally have parents who did not participate in the war as adults. Big difference. Huge.

In this thread; I see a lot of angry, sad, individuals - guilty of everything they are condemning the baby boomer generation of doing.

I get it, you were told how awesome you were as a kid. Told you could be anything you wanted when you grew up. How great life was going to be. All that self-esteem turned into a bitter reminder of what you *should* have been.

Your job sucks. Your family sucks. You never were special. Sure, you get by; but that doesn't give you the warm and fuzzy you so desperately need. Why aren't you a CEO yet? Hell, you have a degree from a college....why haven't the velvet ropes parted for you?

It MUST BE that SOMEONE is keeping it from you. OLD PEOPLE. Those SELFISH BABYBOOMERS. They are why your life is screwed up. Yeah - that old guy who has the better job than you. If only he'd retired 20 years ago....then....MAYBE....maybe you'd have his job. Yeah - that's it. It's not you. It's THEM. THEY are keeping you down. If you could just get a break, then they'd all see how great you really are. Just like your Mom and your 3rd grade elementary teacher told you. Then you'd be a famous scientist or a CEO or a doctor - instead of a washed up realtor working at the Home Depot.

My parents are Boomers (b. '47 & '51) and I think they are doing well for themselves. They seem to have their shiat together. Good retirement plan, has money in the savings and didn't lose much in the stock market crash a few years ago. Their house and cars are paid off, and they can travel a little more than they used to with me in the house. I am very proud of them, because I can remember scraping by in the '80s.

Fark_Guy_Rob:It MUST BE that SOMEONE is keeping it from you. OLD PEOPLE. Those SELFISH BABYBOOMERS. They are why your life is screwed up. Yeah - that old guy who has the better job than you. If only he'd retired 20 years ago....then....MAYBE....maybe you'd have his job. Yeah - that's it. It's not you. It's THEM. THEY are keeping you down. If you could just get a break, then they'd all see how great you really are. Just like your Mom and your 3rd grade elementary teacher told you. Then you'd be a famous scientist or a CEO or a doctor - instead of a washed up realtor working at the Home Depot.

cynicalbastard:cryinoutloud: I'm getting pretty sick of this stupid "boomer" term. First of all, doesn't it cover about 20 years? I have about as much in common with a 65-year-old as I do with a 30-year-old, and I'm supposedly a young Boomer.

Also, I hate it when people are grouped by some arbitrary thing, and then everyone says, "Well, that group is ALL that way." Really? Because of the time someone happened to be born? Do you believe in astrology too?

Because I'm a Gemini, and I feel like I can only really relate to other Geminis. It's nobody's fault--it's in the stars.

THIS.Seriously, I'm in the same bracket. And this grouping is retarded, as you say. Furthermore, in the late '60's for every boomer getting stoned in college, experimenting with communal living, growing magic 'shrooms, trying to freak out their parents, there were about a hundred if not more who couldn't afford college or could at best afford auto repair, machinist or photography courses at community college, were just hoping to try and get a decent job, and might have toked up a few times at parties but would no more shoot something into their veins than they would jump into a cesspool for thrills. The only thing they might have shared with the former group was possibly a liking for the Beatles or Rolling Stones.And us folks born 1960 or later have next to nothing in common with the first boomers, as you say. Our scene wasn't peace and love- our scene was Clint Eastwood and Charles Bronson.

Don't forget the Bay City Rollers, Shawn Cassidy, Rex Smith, Kristy McNichol and Robbie Benson. They are the generation too young for Woodstock, but too old for MTV (1960-1964). Heck - even Cindy Brady was older than those post-boomers.

StoneColdAtheist:This part I actually agree with. Boomers born in the first decade of our generation are the direct progeny of WW2 veterans, and are imprinted with their hopes, dreams and fears (lots of those!). In contrast, those born in the later '50s and up to '64, generally have parents who did not participate in the war as adults. Big difference. Huge.

There's definitely a cultural difference there, yes. Who knows what brought about the bb/wg extremism but it was incredibly damaging to society overall and it doesn't seem to have mapped to subsequent generations.

brantgoose:God, I hate Rocket Robin Hood though. Have you seen Crusader Rabbit, the first made-for-TV crap? You have to be really picky digging through TV cartoons, but some of them have enormous camp value or period charm.

And so I'll see your Rocket Robin Hood and raise you The Grinch Who Stole Christmas and the 1960s Charlie Brown holiday specials, before they ran out of good holidays and had to do Charlie Brown and the True Meaning of Arbor Day.

I'd like to see that Crusader Rabbit just to see if it brings up vomit like the old Rocket Robin Hood cartoons did. Yes, there are always exceptions.

bbfreak:C: We Xers and Yers will certainly get our chance to fark things up, but meanwhile we have every right to blame boomers. If we're the way we are, its because you folks haven't exactly given us a rosy future to look forward to. Granted, its a viscous cycle in which one generation farks over the other over time.

Not really -- the baby boomers made debt a way of life and farking over their kids part of their expectations (even to this day when they want credit-card paid for 'tax cuts'). I don't see the younger generation doing the same, nor rejecting their own values like the baby boomers have done. It didn't help that a large portion of them because social conservative nutcases, either.

Fark_Guy_Rob:It MUST BE that SOMEONE is keeping it from you. OLD PEOPLE. Those SELFISH BABYBOOMERS. They are why your life is screwed up. Yeah - that old guy who has the better job than you. If only he'd retired 20 years ago....then....MAYBE....maybe you'd have his job.

Well, it's accurate.

Company by company, top management is on average getting older and older. It hasn't always been this way. People used to get old, retire, and gracefully make room for the next generation. Succession planning was a big deal for companies. Now that the boomers are in these positions, however, the attitude has changed. They've entrenched themselves and aren't showing any signs of retiring. This keeps GenX held down as perpetual middle-managers, which holds down GenY as a perpetual non-management class. The cycle has been broken, and us non-boomers are rightfully pissed off.

Career mobility (in general) is basically frozen until these Boomers finally start to die off.

bigdavediode:bbfreak: C: We Xers and Yers will certainly get our chance to fark things up, but meanwhile we have every right to blame boomers. If we're the way we are, its because you folks haven't exactly given us a rosy future to look forward to. Granted, its a viscous cycle in which one generation farks over the other over time.

Not really -- the baby boomers made debt a way of life and farking over their kids part of their expectations (even to this day when they want credit-card paid for 'tax cuts'). I don't see the younger generation doing the same, nor rejecting their own values like the baby boomers have done. It didn't help that a large portion of them because social conservative nutcases, either.

You make it sound like identity/responsibility/the "soul" are things that pertain to generations and socio-cultural circumstances rather than to individual people and their choices. That people can be blamed and condemned merely for being born in a particular context regardless of their actual role and choices in the given historical context.

Your perspective is flawed even if some of your philosophical criticisms of the prevailing social and cultural features of an era are valid.

cryinoutloud:I like how they wrote a two-page article describing boomers, with a couple of disclaimers of ".....now we can't go around generalizing about such a large group", then go right on generalizing about them.

Party Boy: sourceNo matter how old I get, I'll never vote Republican. And my mother, who is too old to even be a Boomer, is not a Republican either, despite her many flaws. We never got rich enough to want to grind everybody else into the dirt.

You'll never vote Republican because you've created a mental model of what a 'Republican' is and thinks, and will henceforth refuse to reexamine that decision. By definition, you're a bigot.

Thorndyke Barnhard:You make it sound like identity/responsibility/the "soul" are things that pertain to generations and socio-cultural circumstances rather than to individual people and their choices. That people can be blamed and condemned merely for being born in a particular context regardless of their actual role and choices in the given historical context.

Your perspective is flawed even if some of your philosophical criticisms of the prevailing social and cultural features of an era are valid.

I don't make it sound like that, and in fact have posted that generalizations are just that, generalizations. However they do apply in broad strokes across the worst generation -- perhaps even more than most other generations. I don't know why the narcissism, self-interest and short-sightedness took so strongly among that generation.

stiletto_the_wise:Fark_Guy_Rob: It MUST BE that SOMEONE is keeping it from you. OLD PEOPLE. Those SELFISH BABYBOOMERS. They are why your life is screwed up. Yeah - that old guy who has the better job than you. If only he'd retired 20 years ago....then....MAYBE....maybe you'd have his job.

Well, it's accurate.

Company by company, top management is on average getting older and older. It hasn't always been this way. People used to get old, retire, and gracefully make room for the next generation. Succession planning was a big deal for companies. Now that the boomers are in these positions, however, the attitude has changed. They've entrenched themselves and aren't showing any signs of retiring. This keeps GenX held down as perpetual middle-managers, which holds down GenY as a perpetual non-management class. The cycle has been broken, and us non-boomers are rightfully pissed off.

Career mobility (in general) is basically frozen until these Boomers finally start to die off.

Which also of course contributes heavily to our societal belief that everyone needs to go to college and get a degree. The whole concept of rising to the top is long-dead, and people have had to rely pnshony degrees for promotions. Well now that is no longer the case either, mobility is stalled. No one has the heart to break it to my peers and the kids in high school that all their hard work in/toward college is pretty worthless at this point. But it's not a problem, because boomers deserve to be able to work away the boredom of old age!

This is not mine, it was posted on the internet a few years ago. I encourage those bashing the Boomers to pick up a copy of "Generations" by Howe and Strauss.

I'd like Millennial Generation readers to think about an older generation.

This generation was raised by parents who believed children should be given every opportunity to succeed, with much pampering and coddling... similar to when you were a Baby on Board.

Nevertheless, in young adulthood they became disaffected and radical. They were strident about redressing social inequalities, yearning for a more perfect union. They confronted human rights injustices, sometimes filling city streets with angry protest marches.

In their anomy, many became travelers, anointing Europe as the ultimate destination for reinvention. Tattoos gained popularity as "travel markers."

They inspired a rebellion in office fashion by adopting flashy, form-fitting attire. Insisting that showing skin is more congruent with modern times, they ushered sexuality out of the bedroom and into media.

Because they were a mass-media generation, they fostered collective awareness of their stylistic differences in sharp juxtaposition to older, more conservative generations. They opposed zealous censorship, claiming that contemporary media should present the full range of human experience.

They were the first generation to create health & fitness fads, with thought leaders even advocating vegetarian diets to assure well-being and longevity. They created mass markets for fitness facilities, natural foods, self-directed healthcare and alternative medicine.

In a vein similar to Millennials' preferred approach to written communications - text messaging - literary superstars of this generation adopted terse minimalism and understatement. They invented a transformational form of musical expression, similar in originality to hip-hop. Then personal electronic media became the preferred method for entertainment delivery.

bigdavediode:I don't make it sound like that, and in fact have posted that generalizations are just that, generalizations. However they do apply in broad strokes across the worst generation -- perhaps even more than most other generations. I don't know why the narcissism, self-interest and short-sightedness took so strongly among that generation.

Maybe it's your terminology. It's not just about generalization; you are assigning broad comparative value-laden terms like "worst" to the arbitrarily delimited concept of a "generation". Given limited information or even explanation, you just can't do that without sounding utterly irrational.

stiletto_the_wise:Company by company, top management is on average getting older and older. It hasn't always been this way. People used to get old, retire, and gracefully make room for the next generation. Succession planning was a big deal for companies. Now that the boomers are in these positions, however, the attitude has changed. They've entrenched themselves and aren't showing any signs of retiring. This keeps GenX held down as perpetual middle-managers, which holds down GenY as a perpetual non-management class. The cycle has been broken, and us non-boomers are rightfully pissed off.

I'd be interested to read respected articles that support these points.

But let me make just one counter-point. Today is the VERY FIRST DAY IN HISTORY that a boomer reached the traditional age of retirement, yet here you are saying we're entrenched and holding you down. How the fark are we supposed to have gotten out of your way in any significant numbers before now?

Career mobility (in general) is basically frozen until these Boomers finally start to die off.

Yeah, about that. Someone above pointed out that later-half boomers may never retire. Medical advances and "means testing" Medicare and Social Security (inevitable in my opinion) will mean lots of boomers will have to work until they drop, which will, in fact, create job stresses for younger workers. But we aren't there yet, and won't be for another decade or more.

So get to work, or better yet start your own business while you're still young. That's what I keep telling my kids...don't wait around pining for lifetime employment from some benign employer, cuz it ain't gonna happen. One is on his way. He's failed a couple of times, but will succeed one of these tries. The other seems destined for a career in academia, so I don't see it happening there.

Whining about while wishing my generation would die off is a losing proposition.

uncletogie:StoneColdAtheist: How the fark are we supposed to have gotten out of your way in any significant numbers before now?

Stop running for f*cking office and imposing the "morality" of a bygone era on the rest of us, for a start....

You see, this is part of your generation's problem. You don't want to pay your dues and work your way to the top over a lifetime. You want older folks to just "get out of your way" as soon as you're interested in something.

But while we're on the topic, have you run for office? Volunteered for someone you respect running for office? Anything? Or are you just whinging?

Take your time. I got all day...though I might have to take an afternoon nap.

StoneColdAtheist:You see, this is part of your generation's problem. You don't want to pay your dues and work your way to the top over a lifetime. You want older folks to just "get out of your way" as soon as you're interested in something.

Nobody wants older folks to "just get out of their way" only to stop strip mining everything and anything for a dollar, leaving succeeding generations with little and mortgaging their kids. All while ranting how they worked hard for it and they were self-made.